the right-wing presidential candidate, François Fillon, Has become three years ago, the victim of a partisan judiciary? Have distorted the election result”,” as the former Minister of the interior Brice Hortefeux (LR) claimed on Sunday? The suspicion has fed the now-retired Prosecutor Eliane Houlette, the 2017 identified as the head of the Department for financial crime against the Prime Minister. In front of the parliamentary investigation Commission of the national Assembly, you said under oath that at the time, pressure had been exerted on them.

Michaela Wiegel

Political correspondent, based in Paris.

F. A. Z. Twitter

to open up So they should be repeated by your supervisor, attorney General, Catherine Champ, Renault, prompted a criminal case against Fillon. They did, however, want the preliminary investigation to continue. The fast charge collection, which was announced at the beginning of March, marked a turning point in the presidential campaign. Leading party members such as Bruno Le Maire Gérald Darmanin, today the Minister of Finance and budget Minister, left the campaign team. Fillons poll numbers plummeted.

President Macron responded immediately

The admission of the Prosecutor is important because the verdict is in the criminal process against Fillon short. President Emmanuel Macron has immediately responded and asked at the weekend, the judicial authorities of an investigation of the allegations. The Supreme Council of judges and prosecutors shall decide, as a disciplinary organ of misconduct, he is now dealing with the case.